>> Okay. I will introduce you first. Yes. I'm Cameron. Welcome to
accessibility NYC! Sorry for the delays. We're all set up now. I
just wanted to say some thank yous to start off with. Thank you
to Thoughtbot for hosting us tonight. This is Thoughtbot. And
they're a web and mobile development consultancy. They do design,
development. If you're curious, talk to Tyson over here. He's a
designer at Thoughtbot. I also wanted to say thank you to SSB
BART for their ongoing support and sponsorship. And to all of you
for joining tonight.
So let's... Oh, and to Joly and the Internet Society of New York
for ongoing help with streaming and support. And Mirabai Knight,
who is doing the captions. White Coat Captioning. They do all
sorts of events, including technical events. And she's amazing.
Thank you, Mirabai.
>> And on that note, let's get started in with Shawn. Shawn
Lauriat is here. He's one of the organizers of the Meetup. I'll
let you take it away.
>> So yeah. I'm Shawn Lauriat. I've been a mentor for Open Style
Lab for the last few semesters, which I'll get into in a moment.
For more introduction, day job-wise, I'm a software engineer. I
lead a group of engineers at Google working on accessibility.
Which is kind of how I got into this. But I'll explain that. So I
tweeted out a link to the slides in response to the tweet that
our Meetup group put up a while back announcing this. So anybody
can follow these links.
>> So Open Style Lab is a non-profit that has been doing a co-lab
and partnership with Parsons, the New School for design for a
year and a half, two years now. I think it started in Cambridge,
at MIT. A year and a half ago, Grace, who runs Open Style Lab
here in New York came and gave a talk on it and some of the
projects and some of the background where it came from, which was
super cool. So it basically was forming teams of designers and
engineers and people with disabilities to accomplish a specific
goal for the person with disabilities.
And so she gave some talks, showed some videos of projects, and
that sort of thing. Talked about the creation of the program.
I've linked to a couple of articles here that recently went out.
So one is designing for all abilities. This is a New York Times
feature that went out from the spring semester final projects.
And recently -- the next phase of inclusive fashion, designing
for the disabled, which is a feature in Vogue. So I now have
worked on a project in Vogue, which is something I never thought
I would say. But I think that's badass. So at any rate, the way
that it works is teams form at the very beginning. So the program
is a semester long, which is not terribly long to do some of the
things that these teams have accomplished. But you start off with
engineers, designers, occupational therapists, and people with
disabilities.
So you have generally kind of one person in each category.
Sometimes you have a couple of engineers. Sometimes you have no
occupational therapist. But everybody is teamed with a person
with disabilities who has a specific need. So typically, as an
example, somebody might be a wheelchair user who doesn't really
have rain gear that actually protects their lab or their legs or
their gear, the back of the chair. That's fairly common, just
because raincoats weren't really made to be used in a sitting
position. But there's a bunch of other projects that have
happened as well. But they form into these teams. And one of the
things that I really like about this program is that it's not
just -- okay, let's get engineers, designers, and occupational
therapists together, meet a person with disabilities, and then
say... Okay, you just wait here and we'll come back with
something awesome for you in 12 weeks or 10 weeks or 8 weeks.
And not actually involve the person in the decision making at
all. Because a lot of times, then you run into situations where
you're not actually addressing the person's real issues, or
you're not making something to their preference. But you're not
including them at all. Which is really detrimental. So the thing
that's awesome with this is that the person is basically like a
full fledged team member. They take part in experimentation, in
prototyping, and give feedback. They come up with ideas. I've
seen them brainstorm things that ended up in the final projects.
So it's a super collaborative effort, and everybody ends up doing
kind of everything all over the board.
So you have engineers learning how to sew. You have designers
learning how to code. It crosses all these boundaries and
everybody learns a lot. But it's pretty cool. So the next stage
that happens, that I'm aware of, because as a mentor, I'm not
there every single class. I'm there basically three or four
classes, I show up for a bit, and I see where things have gone
and then offer some insights, or help with brainstorming. So the
first place that I come in is the forming of design requirements.
So this is after the team has formed. This is after they've met
their client and they've talked about what problems do you have
that might be able to be solved through wardrobe or technology.
And really get to meet the person, get a sense of their style,
get a sense of their lives. How do they interact? How do they
move around the city? What's their commute like? What do they
like to do? And they take all of that information, and put it --
this brainstorming board that Grace has a fancy name for, that I
can't remember, but it's covered in stickies and paper arrows
crossing over each other, there's photos all over the place,
swatches of fabric up at the top. Some of the stickies -- hey,
Grace! Grace is here who leads this, and can now keep me honest.
So some of the stickies up here are showing relationships between
different terms. Some terms are chair, quadbelly, leg, other
things, material, body temp, weather, durability, aesthetics. And
really trying to map out what the core problems are, what the
core constraints are, and really trying to collect all of it into
an actual mission statement for the team. And something to keep
in mind is this is week... When does this happen? Like week two?
Week three? Out of... Ten weeks. So this is the point where,
like, you're forming the mission, and then it feels like week ten
is really far off. Until, like, two weeks later. So there's a lot
of experimentation that happens after this. So this was an
experiment that I suggested that the team do, which ended up
helping them. Phew. Good. So this was a gentleman who has -- some
of his vertebrae are compressed, and so it ends up having -- his
back is not shaped like my back. Like, it has a different
curvature to it. And it basically means that sitting in chairs is
extremely painful. Especially for a long period of time. Because
it just doesn't support his back in a way that it really needs
to. And so the team was saying... Okay, well, we need to support
his back. But they didn't know how much and they didn't know
where. And they also didn't know what would be painful, what
would be not enough support, that sort of thing. So I advised
them to just slap together a way that they could map out his
back. Pressure-wise. So this picture shows this muslin taped to
his back. Spread over the entire thing. Just a grid. And they're
attaching pressure sensors. They're really cheap little
components, and they're just taping that to different points, and
that all gets fed into a breadboard and an Arduino, and they're
taking little measurements. They don't have to scale it. They
don't have to make a pressure-mapping product. This is slapped
together so they have an idea. And they read the numbers. 10 is
not enough pressure. 100 is way too much pressure. And they just
mapped out all these points, and it didn't take all that long.
But it ended up kind of really interesting, because they could
make a literal pressure map of his back. And that meant that not
only could they know what needed more pressure where, or what
would be too much pressure, but they didn't actually need him
there to test, when they were testing the different materials,
because they could just measure the pressure that a given
material could support. And they also took a mold of his back. So
they could also do fittings of this pressure vest without him
there. So they just kind of abstracted the physical requirements
of, like, okay, Doug, we need you to come in again, or okay,
somebody needs to trace down Doug. And this way they could hammer
out some of the details without having to coordinate that. Which
is super important when now you're at, like, six weeks out from
final. Prototyping. So this is a picture of -- a series of
pictures, sorry. I just went through the pictures that I had
taken with all of these things, and I realized that I didn't
remember where I kept them, so I found the best that I could. So
this is a picture of some things that weren't the actual project
itself. This was a coat for a young woman who -- her arms are
completely paralyzed. So putting on and taking off a coat is not
easy. To say the least. And so they were making a coat that could
be a lot easier to put on and off. Protect when it's cold. That
sort of thing. And they ended up doing a fantastic job. The time
that it took for her to put on a coat went from, like, four or
five minutes or something very long, to like a minute and a half.
I think they were aiming for two minutes and they blew it away.
But the prototyping here that I'll walk Julie toward -- so I can
point. So on the left, there's different fabrics. And the
different fabrics were important, because as you're scooping your
head through the neck in order to then stand up and have it drape
down over you, the fabrics were super, super important, which
they found out when they were prototyping with the muslins, which
is super light, super cheap fabric that you can create whatever
patterns you want, and try it on, which is awesome for sizing,
but it's not awesome for how the fabric actually slides over you,
or how it holds its shape. That sort of thing. So they ended up
looking at the fabrics a lot for the the liner itself, so that it
was smooth enough to just slide down, but also have the
necklining firm enough that when she would put the coat in her
lap, it would hold the neck shape enough that she could stick her
neck through without having to bite it and pull it up and try it
again without it falling through her ponytail. So this process
they did rapidly with not only the fit and the shape, but also
the fabrics, because that was essential. More iterating! So I
brought up the more iterating, because this team did so much
fitting. It was astonishing. They also had fewer weeks than the
other team, because their client was going to a wedding, and he
was flying out when the final exam or the final presentations
were happening. So they actually finished their project a week
early, which I don't know how they did, but they did. So this
iteration -- something to note in the background -- there's a
series of mannequins. So the one in the foreground is the final
project. The ones in the background are a whole bunch of
different fittings. This was for a gentleman who... He didn't
have any mobility from around the waist or upper waist down. But
he needed a formal jacket that he could wear. And he had one that
was really, really old, really uncomfortable, because when you're
in a chair, your back is right up against the back of the chair,
and that can rub in unpleasant ways. It can build up sweat. Also
your arms tend to sit like this, because you're in a chair, so
having super straight sleeves means it bunches up here and it
just kind of looks like crap. Also just the lay of his shoulders
and everything was not really helpful. So they did a whole bunch
of experimentation with fit. They did all kinds of modifications.
They shortened the jacket so it wouldn't bunch up, removed the
pockets because there's not really a need for that, and I think
they used liner underneath that would wick away the sweat, as
well as some patches under here, to make it a little more
breathable, because he didn't have to walk around in it and have
this all open. It just needed to wick the sweat away. But the
wool that they used over it kept the formal aesthetic of it. But
then each of the iterations, they were going for different
fabrics, different shapes and everything like that. But because
fabrics aren't super cheap, you don't need to prototype the
entire jacket. You can just prototype the sleeve and that
particular shoulder joint and see what works. And I think they
also iterated on the collar shape, basically just for aesthetics.
Just to make sure that it was actually the style that he needed.
Because if you go to a formal event, you don't want it to look
like something that you would never wear. Feel free to interrupt
with questions or corrections, for those from Open Style Lab.
Okay. More iterating. So this was a project that -- it was really
interesting. So the woman... Let's see. I have it written down.
Because I can never remember it. Ehlers-Danlos syndrome, which
basically means that she doesn't actually have collagen in her
body, which means no ligaments. Which means that every time she
goes to sleep or when she's moving around, her joints tend to
dislocate very, very easily. She does... I think she does
physical therapy, because she works out a lot, because she has to
build up the muscle tone, because it's the muscle tone that
actually keeps her joints together. So she typically wears a
brace, which looks really ugly and like medical equipment. And it
also doesn't work great. And so this team was making a
replacement that she could wear out and about, but it had to be
super durable, but it also had to have... What is the term for
the different places where it joins? Well, it had to have the
compression, but I'm thinking for the zippers and buckles and
things. There's a term for that. And I'm spacing on it. Closures.
Thank you. So they had to experiment with clothing closures,
specifically because when she wakes up in the morning, a lot of
times her fingers are dislocated, and so she doesn't have great
ability to manipulate very fine things, and it's actually a very
painful process, as well as frustrating. So the important part
for this was the shoulder compression, so that it would keep her
shoulders in, at a certain point. So she had two braces. There
was one for each shoulder. Which would kind of double up. It's
also a really involved process for her to take them on and off.
And she wasn't really happy with them when they were on. So they
iterated... This is actually three of the five prototypes that
they made. They experimented with fabrics. So they went from a
lighter lengthwise reinforced fabric to a series of firmer
adjustable black straps, which ended up proving way too
complicated to manage, and then finally the black fabric result
on the right, which kind of resembled the first, design-wise. But
with something more adjustable. So it had snaps on the front that
were a lot easier for her to manage. The tightness of it... So
this buckle, the snap in the front would delegate how much
pressure was on the shoulder, because it was actually the snap
from the thing wrapping around the back. And then finally
projects and presentations. So these are some pictures of final
projects. Which are always so impressive to me, because it starts
off in -- you saw a bunch of the prototypes. They were just
muslin. It looked like it was made in ten minutes, because
sometimes they were. But ultimately, it turns into a seriously
real product. It's a seriously real piece that is made with
fabric that's made for whatever the cause is. So on the left here
is a rain jacket that was made for a woman who uses a wheelchair,
and it had kind of a modified shape, so that it could cover her
lap and has a flap going, covering kind of a backpack that would
sit on the back of the chair. She had -- this team made several
things. One thing that I really had to do with this team was try
to get them to focus on a narrower scope. So I think they only
did three. So they did visibility at night, with reflective gear,
reflective materials on glove additions. The glove additions also
were made to be a lot more durable. Because this woman, as she's
wheeling around town, you wear through gloves like nothing.
Because you're just doing this all the time. So they ended up
making all these different kind of slip-on things that you could
put over gloves that were just the index finger and the thumb.
Basically to give only this area more support. Because it was
really this seam that tended to wear down the most. So they have
loads of pictures of gloves of April's, that were just completely
worn through, and it was like a couple of weeks. And now the
gloves are shot. So I think they used, for one of the glove
additions, a combination of leather and knit Kevlar. And they
moved the seam, so that it wasn't here. So super, super durable
material. But also something that she can trade off and put on
over other gloves. Or just over her hand. But also moving the
seam just so that wouldn't get the stress repeatedly on kind of
the most vulnerable point. Next over, there's another rain jacket
for Team Pete. Who is actually a member of the Meetup group.
Which is awesome. So this rain jacket is super cool, because it's
not only protective, and it protects the lap and everything that
I mentioned for April's jacket. It also has a laser-cut design in
the left cuff. Not completely through. It's still waterproof. But
it's just so that he can see the Drive watch that he has for his
power chair. So that way, he can see the indicator through the
jacket, even when he has it all on. The other cool thing is that
-- so Pete does have some mobility in his legs and his hips. So
he can stand and walk around when the occasion calls for it. So
he needed a jacket that would work both when sitting and when
standing. So this jacket, as it is right now, you can almost make
it out in the picture. It's kind of cut in like this, so that it
just has two flaps. Going on the legs. So that way, when you sit
down, it covers your lap. But when you stand up, you can reach in
to these folds on the side, and grab the fabric, and pull, and
there's just two magnets holding the rest of it in place. And
when you pull it out, it flaps out to cover the entire back side
of you. So it turns into a long mid-thigh rain jacket. It also
looks really badass. I would love if I could have one as well.
But... It's custom-made. I can't. And then the last one that's
here is a beautiful winter jacket. It's wool, but it was very
heavily designed for the client. Team Sian, who is also a member
of the Meetup, which is super cool. There's a pattern here. So
for Xian's jacket, she has cerebral palsy, but she works with ski
poles. She has a lot of mobility, but she moves her arms when she
walks. She relies on that heavily. So there tends to be a lot of
movement and stress on arms in here. There tends to be a lot of
sweat buildup on the shoulders. Because she needs her ski poles
when standing, she can't stand up and put the jacket on. So she
puts the jacket on in a chair and then stands up. Which for most
jackets means she tries to stand up and she's tied to a chair. So
this one has flaps at an angle, so when she stands up, they open
up. Similar to a riding jacket for horse riding, where you have
an entire jacket that covers all around you, but it's kind of
like tails. So it goes around the front of you as well. So it's
split. That way, for the riding jacket, if you're sitting on a
horse, your legs are protected and you don't have a jacket
bunched up behind you on a saddle. So that was some of the
inspiration for that design choice. And there's a hood that comes
out of that collar. Which I didn't even notice. I knew that it
was happening, but I couldn't tell that it was actually there,
seeing it in person. Because it's... Xian does a lot of public
speaking, and so she really needs to have that kind of
professional air about her, when she's going out and public
speaking. So it can't be like... Here's my jacket and my hood
flapping behind me. So it tucks into that collar, rolls up very,
very small and tucks into the collar. But the hood was super
necessary, because in addition to not being able to stand up and
put a jacket on, because of the need for the ski poles, you also
can't hold an umbrella, when you're walking around with ski
poles. So the hood was super necessary, just to prevent her head
from being completely soaked and the rain getting into her
jacket. So there are several videos that I've linked to here.
Like I said, I tweeted out a link to the slides. But I figured I
could at least show one video. I have no idea if I have sound
hooked up to this. But the videos are captioned. There's no
sound. And I think it's hiding the captions. Okay. I'm gonna
cover up the captions that are down here for a moment to see if
expanding the window makes it so that we can see the captions in
the video. And then once the video is done playing or I determine
that's just a no-go, then I'll put these captions back. Stay
there. All right. I'm not gonna go back and forth and try to
figure this out in front of everybody. So like I said, I linked
to the slides. In my tweet. Work! Here we go. So each of these
four videos are the videos from the most recent class that just,
just, just ended, and did their final presentations. The other
thing that I don't know how the teams did is how they managed to
put together really nice polished videos in addition to actually
finishing their projects. But definitely check them out. It's
super cool. They tell the story. They're a couple minutes long
each. So it's not a lot of time dedication. Have a look. It has
the production to the client, kind of the backstory of what are
the challenges that this person is facing. What kind of iteration
they did. What kind of prototyping happened. What challenges they
had. And ultimately, building out the real thing. Team April's
video ends in a super cool demo of the rain jacket. Literally in
a shower she sticks goggles on and they're just like... Douse.
She says it actually works spectacularly. She and the chair were
both dry at the end of it. Yeah. We have some of the fellows
here. So mill about after I'm done chattering. You can also ask
them loads of questions. Raise hands, those who are in. There we
go. But yeah. There are some really great illustrations of how
the teams managed to get the projects together. And just some of
the design choices that were made, because a lot of the point of
this project is not... Okay. Let's create assistive technology.
It's more... Let's create a wearable that just looks like it was
made for the person. It doesn't look like a medical device. Even
though it does have certain things taken into account for a
person's disability. It's not the point. So, like, Team Marci
ended up putting together formal wear, and the point of it is to
look like formal wear. It's supposed to look really nice. It's
not supposed to look like a medical device. And they did a great
job. So please check out the videos. And any questions? Cameron?
>> This may be for the fellows in particular. But I was
wondering... Was there anything that came out of this work that
informed things that you might do in broader designs for
everyone? So that people who don't have access to getting
something customized might be able to still buy something off the
rack that's made for anyone, but with some considerations built
in for (inaudible)?
>> I hope I'm answering your question. I think with the jumpsuit,
I think a lot of women would relate to... It's kind of a pain in
the ass to put it on and also use the bathroom. And so we created
an access port for Marci to use a catheter, where she doesn't
have the issue where she has to take the whole thing off. We had
it so we had an access point where she would just stretch it in
the front and insert a catheter. And we could find other ways so
that maybe for people who don't need the catheter, just so that
it could become a pair of pants. So it's very... You can do a lot
of things.
>> Yeah. One of the biggest things I noticed in this process with
the physical therapists is the understanding from that world
being applied to fashion, which is my world. And purely just
making that consideration in the beginning can create options
that perhaps weren't applicable to people who are fully able-
bodied, but doing this process actually resulted in useful
solutions.
>> (inaudible) I see most of these are really custom.
>> Sorry. Can you speak a little bit...
>> Oh, sorry. So I noticed that these are custom designs for
specific use cases. But I feel like some of the conditions are
more widespread. They're more general. Right? Are there any
benefits to approaching this from a modular perspective? So a
module for this, for this condition, a module for this condition.
Because then that becomes easier to mass-produce?
>> Right. Grace, I feel like you could answer that better than I
could.
>> Yes. So (inaudible). But I think for the sake of (inaudible),
not simply make a product and be like... Here. This is what you
should wear. But (inaudible) but eventually, after doing this for
four years, I see a lot of commonalities. Those commonalities are
what I hope can be considered universal design or design aspects
to help design some products. So that's a long story. But
(inaudible).
>> If you ask more questions, can you stand close to this mic?
This mic is on. But there's a lot of room noise.
>> Okay.
>> So yeah. With what Grace said, a lot of the projects had a lot
of commonalities. So pretty much every semester there's been
somebody who's said -- okay, I'm a wheelchair user. And dealing
with the rain in New York City is just awful. Pretty true. So
there's a lot of common threads through them. There's a lot of
differences through each of the specific projects, just because
each person has their own very specific needs. But there's
definitely a lot of overlap between things. Where every single
person is like... Yeah. The backpack that I stick on the back of
my chair also gets wet, and not just me. My chair also gets wet,
not just me. Even if a rain jacket is covering my torso, and even
if you get a rain jacket that's long enough that will cover your
legs, or what most people do -- wear a rain jacket and stick a
garbage bag over your legs -- your chair and pack are still
getting wet. These happen to everybody. So going a modular route
would be a good idea for handling things like that. Also the
common wear and tear for places. The gloves for chair users just
seems like kind of... This should not be that difficult, to find
gloves that can just withstand that. But it is. Cameron?
>> The focus on fashion, I guess, is interesting to me, because
I'm a web developer. So when I think about accessibility, I think
of it in terms of digital accessibility. And one of the guiding
factors in digital accessibility is web standards, and Americans
with Disabilities Act, as it applies to digital spaces. Is there
anything like that for fashion? Or even for, like, product
design? Similar to... Does the ADA apply to fashion in any
regard? I don't know. I think I may have a guess.
>> Sort of. But it tends to apply a lot more for, like, the
stores in which they are selling clothing. And even then, they
don't do great at that. Especially in New York. Where floor space
is hard. And so your aisles are all as skinny as this pedestal.
The other side of that is there are some guidelines for things
like this, but it tends to be a lot more on the medical side. So
if any of these teams were to try to market their projects as a
medical device, there are all kinds of laws about that. But it's
more for the red tape and the testing that it has to go through
in order for it to be approved as an insurance... Whatever they
call it. Like a code for that specific thing. Which is also,
because of that whole process, typically why these... Typically
unattractive and kind of okay medical devices, especially for the
shoulder brace that I mentioned... They're not great. But there's
not a lot of competition. It also might have been made for
somebody in a particular case, and it just wasn't really able to
tackle this one in the same way. So as far as I know, there's not
really the same guidelines and rules as far as the actual
clothing construction itself, especially around fastening and
that sort of thing. Because you get zippers that have, like,
tiny, tiny little pulls, that if you just have fingers as big as
mine, you still struggle with. Or snaps that require a certain
amount of pressure that for somebody might be painful. Or
impossible to undo. That's a really long I don't know.
>> I have all sorts of questions.
>> (inaudible) might not be the best way is to just follow the
seven principles of universal design.
>> Sorry to interrupt. Can you speak toward the table? I know
you're responding to him, sorry.
>> At the very minimum, you can start at the seven principles of
universal design. I can't name all of them. But ease of use. Even
though it might not be specifically for fashion, it's a good way
to guide you.
>> That's another question I had, actually. About universal
design in general, that... I guess universal design as a concept,
I discovered, is contentious in some ways. That the idea that
accessibility... At least in a digital context... Does not always
overlap with...
>> Sorry. Coming back.
>> Accessibility accommodations are not always the same as
universal design, and vice versa. So were there any points
where... Did that come up at all? Does that apply in the same
way? As, like, were there any things where you said to
yourself... This would be... I guess maybe it's more of a
conversation. But, like, I've noticed this is a trend, of people
talking about universal design. And then also pushing back on it.
And I'm wondering if that conversation came up at all. During the
process.
>> I know it at least came up in some conversations that I was
having with folks during the program. And I expect it came up
more than that. One of the things that's really cool about this
program, and having it just like... No, you are designing for
this person right here. This is Christopher. This is April.
You're just designing for this one person. But it's in the
context of somebody's masters degree. Or it's in the context of
whatever program somebody's going through. Which then that
experience can apply back in ways that is like... Okay. Well,
somebody might not interact with this the same way. Somebody
might not have the same kind of mobility. What if we adapted this
design in this specific way, in order to just accommodate more
people? Like, it doesn't have to affect the aesthetics of it. We
could just make this accommodation and make it easier for
everybody. So like the classic example of the kitchen gadgets.
The Oxo gadgets. Where it's like... That was made from the start
with one person in mind. Who had arthritis. But ended up being
preferred by so many more people, because it's like... Yeah. It's
just easier to grab these things and use it. And, like, twist the
can opener without hurting your hand as you're doing so. That
sort of thing. So I think a lot of the same kinds of things can
come out of this, where, as you're looking at a new design that
you're working on, or as you're working on the engineering behind
something else, we can just say... Oh, well, I remember this
other thing happened. And you can just kind of click back in your
memory to say... Okay. There's other kinds of abilities that
people have and mobility that they have. We could just design
this in a way that will work for more of them. And so it's not
necessarily saying, like, you have to design one thing that every
single person on the planet can use. But it's more of... Kind of
steering things more into the realm where more people can use it,
as opposed to fewer.
>> (inaudible)
>> It sounded like we heard from all the clients that they wanted
products that didn't look adaptive. So one quote that Grace says
is... If you're designing for people with disabilities, then
you're not being inclusive. So the takeaway for that was... Just
because it's adaptive doesn't mean that the garment is designed
specifically for them. It can still be designed for people like
you or I. It doesn't (inaudible).
>> I want that coat.
>> Right? You should have seen it in person. The picture does not
do it justice.
>> And I'm going back to the jumpsuit. We modeled a large part of
it off of stuff that Marci already wears, that she buys at a
regular store. And most people have a pair of leggings that they
wear. She puts it on the way we do. With an attachment at the
top. That might be more convenient for me. It's a more ideal way
of putting on the jeans. It can get rid of some of the things
that are difficult about a jump suit. So it's not novel to what
we consider for an able bodied person to wear the garment.
>> Great.
>> I have another question. I have so many questions. The point
about engineering, where it's like... Engineering design, other
disciplines -- (inaudible) software engineering, again -- what is
the role of the software engineer, technologist, in fashion for
people with disabilities? And more generally?
>> So at least for many of the students who are more on the
engineering side, I don't know the background of the engineers
that were in the summer semester. But I know in spring and fall
there was a lot of design and technology students. So it wasn't
necessarily just software engineering. Though you got people who
came in doing nothing but JavaScript. But it was still in a
program that was more around physical computing and design around
technology and the use of that to create something whole. So it
wasn't just... Okay, well, you get a programmer in here. Welcome.
This is a sewing machine. There were certainly some things that
were more engineering-specific. They had the use of 3D printers
and laser cutters, and things I had never heard of. Kind of to do
the physical side of it, and making things that just otherwise
would just take way too long. Some of the testing and some of the
kind of prototyping did involve more programming experience. So,
like, the thing that I showed where they were doing the pressure
map -- Grace, I don't know if you have examples that get more
technical than that. Temperature sensor. DIY.
>> Understand what your body temperature is doing, versus the
fabric on the body.
>> Why don't you just come over here and talk?
>> No.
>> On our team, I think we used her ability to animate to take
our paper prototypes and essentially communicate and explore the
different ways (inaudible) clothes. That was a way we were able
to (inaudible).
>> This wouldn't have been possible ten years ago. Given that
you're talking about 3D printers, laser cutters, rapid
prototyping. Like, 15, 20 years ago, at least 3D printers were
primitive, right? In an affordable sense.
>> It's all just down to the tools that are available to you.
This would have been possible in the '30s. They just wouldn't
have free-printed everything. The principles and the goals of it
don't really matter for how you're putting it together. All
right. Thanks, everybody! And thank you, Grace, for actually
making this!
(applause)
>> Okay! Well, I want to thank you all again for joining us
tonight. We have the Meetup the first Tuesday of each month. And
the Meetup is gonna be announced on Meetup.com/a11ynyc. Follow us
on Twitter for announcements, and we'll push out the slides. I
think you already put them on the Meetup group?
>> Yeah, I responded to the announcement tweet for this. So if
you go to the Twitter account for this, @a11ynyc, just look for
the thread that started off this announcement, and I replied to
it with a link to the slides, and the slides link all over the
place.
>> Cool. And yeah. Stick around for... What time is it right now?
>> 8:00-ish.
>> Yeah. Stick around. We'll be around for another half an hour
or so. So you can hang out. Talk. Have another drink. And join us
next month. That's it. Thank you so much.
>> Thanks for coming!